One of the candidates in-line to takeover Chelsea have reportedly made their feelings known about Antonio Rudiger.
According to the Evening Standard, at least one of the three remaining applicants ‘insisted’ the German defender ‘would have been kept at any cost’.
Unfortunately for the unnamed party or parties, their wishes haven’t been granted.
This is it for Antonio
Rudiger is set to leave Stamford Bridge in the summer, following a long-running dispute over his contract.
Tying down the 29-year-old to a new deal was difficult enough before Roman Abramovich put the club up for sale.

Fresh contracts cannot be handed out until the Russian’s successor is installed.
Whilst this could potentially happen sometime this week, Rudiger was clearly not willing to wait any longer.
Instead, he will seemingly walk away from Chelsea as a free agent into the arms of Real Madrid.
The Spaniards have tracked the defender throughout the period of uncertainty regarding his future in South West London.
Carlo Ancelotti and the Madrid board clearly like the look of the centre-back, following recent battles against him in the Champions League.
Massive mistake from Chelsea
Now, despite interest from across Europe, Los Blancos are on the verge of sealing a spectacular signing.
On the flip side, Chelsea are in the middle of some seriously bad business.
Losing Rudiger, in general, will go down as a major faux pas, but for zero up front cost is quite astonishing.

Having bought him for £29m (BBC), the Blues could’ve quite easily tripled that figure if they played their cards right.
Sadly, they’ve dealt completely the wrong hand, with Madrid happily taking one of Thomas Tuchel’s prized possessions.
Finding a suitable replacement for Rudiger will certainly be costly, not to mention rather difficult in terms of locating a player with similar skills.
There aren’t many individuals out there like Chelsea’s number two; you could say he’s one of a kind.
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